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Architects do battle: Style wars at the RIBA

13 May, 2010 | By Astragal

At the RIBA in London last week, the private view of the Three Classicists exhibition, previewed in AJ 06.05.10, was busy

So busy that Robert Adam, Twitter’s self-styled Classical Man, tweeted: ‘End of architectural closed shop. Ancient DNA to reinvigorate tired profession.’ Léon Krier, who on the night bore a strong resemblance to Peter Sellers’ Dr Strangelove (he was doing strange things with his arms while he spoke), supported this view, emerging on to a balcony to praise the RIBA for making room for classicism, after years of ignoring it.

But, batting for the non-classicists was former Architectural Review editor Peter Davey. So vocal was Davey in his objections to what was on show that Classical Man was forced to tweet: ‘Peter Davey old-school modernist [proclaims] “this is not the last battle”.’

Fortunately Patrik Schumacher, who heralded the beginning of the architectural style wars in AJ 06.05.10, was nowhere to be seen, or things would have really kicked off.

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The Architects' Journal is the voice of architecture in Britain. We sit at the heart of the debate about British architecture and British cities, and form opinions across the whole construction industry on design-related matters